


Forgetting You

by 264feet



Category: Undertale (Video Game)
Genre: Alzheimer's Disease, Character Death, Emotionally Repressed, Flowey remembering how to love, Gen, Houseplant Flowey, Old Age
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-02-19
Updated: 2016-02-19
Packaged: 2018-05-21 14:15:21
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,569
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6054625
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/264feet/pseuds/264feet
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Flowey helps Frisk in their old age and, in a way, is helped in return. Spiritual sequel to 'wont you let me win this time?'.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Forgetting You

"Howdy, Frisk!" the flower says. "You finally woke up!"  
  
Unfamiliar. The elder would remember falling asleep-- but for how long? They fell asleep plenty of times as a child and as an adult. In retrospect, the amount of times they remember waking up doesn't match, as if they often made it through half a day and started over.  
  
Flowey knows. They don't. Not anymore.  
  
There's a wool blanket pulled up to their chest. Light filters in through a window behind them. The flower is in a pot on a nightstand right nearby, and the impression of lemon-scented cleaner fills the air.  
  
"Flowers don't need to sleep, you know," it continues. Frisk squints at it, as if unsure if they've ever seen it before. "I just spent the night-- shucks, waiting for you to get up, I guess! You looked so cute, innocent, vulnerable... As if I could have snapped your wrinkly old neck at any second!"  
  
They just give Flowey that fucking smile again. The one that never changes, no matter how many decades they age or how many years they leave behind as they do. The room stops. The birds outside fall silent. It's as if time has paused to SAVE, and Flowey feels a tug at where his heart used to be. The sunlight had been warm, but Frisk, unlike the sun, finally made Flowey avert his eyes.  
  
"Morning," Frisk says. They beam, even as their hand shakes as if it were freezing cold in order to reach their glasses. Flowey makes a show of rolling his eyes as he extends a little vine to grasp the glasses and drop them in the old human's hand. "How has a talking flower found himself in my room?"  
  
They ask so sincerely, too. Suddenly, something is itching at Flowey. He tries to adjust himself to no avail. The itching is coming from inside. It's burrowing in his chest, making a home, weighing him down. One of the closest feelings Flowey had to sadness besides the loneliness when everyone else went to sleep.  
  
"I live here," Flowey says, and leaves it at that. He's tried at least a hundred responses by now- I'm the angel of death; golly, I don't know, I took a wrong turn and got stuck in this pot; blue light special at Home Depot- and never gets a response that's funny. They always just chuckle and run their hands along his petals, the way a parent might stroke a child's hair.  
  
Not that Flowey would know.  
  
"Where am I?" they say, then. "Do I live here?"  
  
You'll die here. Or, you idiot, I kidnapped you-- but no, none of the responses are fun. At least it gave Flowey a laugh when he played Boy Who Cried Wolf and claimed Frisk had finally passed away and the whole family came running in, Papyrus and Asgore competing on who could break into a louder and harder sob.  
  
(And of course Frisk never had so much as a bad spill, either from pure Determination or someone else's. Of course, early on, Flowey enjoyed throwing their medicine on the floor and watch Toriel scoop every pill back up. But Frisk themself never responded, and soon the flower found himself reminding them to take the pill each morning, but not without calling them an idiot too.)  
  
"Golly, you got it!" he says. "This is your house, Frisk. _Remember?_ "  
  
Despite his best efforts, a hint of longing hangs onto the end of Flowey's sentence. Frisk's expression remains unchanged. Neither exchange any more words as Frisk pulls the blanket off and moves to sit on the edge of the bed.  
  
Over months and months of experimentation, Flowey has found things that Frisk will remember. They reach their hand out expectantly as they prepare to stand up. A vine finds their way into it and curls around the palm tight, helping them to their feet.  
  
Frisk has a variety of aches and pains now. For once, none of them are caused by Flowey. He watches as they struggle to catch their breath from an act as simple as sitting up. What happened to the child who outran Undyne?  
  
"Come on, geezer, let's get you to your breakfast," Flowey grumbles. He looks away as Frisk scoops his flower pot into their arms. This is futile, he thinks. They have no idea who I am. The old bat's gonna drop dead any second now and crack me open on the floor.  
  
"Thank you. ... Flowey," they say, a strain in their voice, as if not quite there in the moment.  
  
"Let's--" For once, Flowey is caught unprepared. "Let's just get downstairs."  
  
(Flowey is no expert, but the feeling in his mind now is something like the flushed drunkenness that the monsters had after drinking on holidays. It might be similar to joy.)  
  
...  
  
Decades, and Flowey still looks out the window as if he woke up in a different world each day, too. It took a long time and a lot of effort from Frisk the Ambassador, but the more Flowey looks now, the more he sees monster and human children playing together rather than in segregated groups.  
  
To think Asgore had lived long enough to see it, Flowey thinks. Gone from war criminal to vengeful king to... well, soccer coach at the local Elementary, the one Frisk themself graduated from. Everyone loved the big goat. Called him a legendary goalie, even though he just stood there and blocked the net by being giant.  
  
Frisk had taken Flowey to several games. Even in the cold, when the two of them were the only ones in the bleachers besides thinly-spread exhausted parents and Flowey wouldn't shut up about how stupid this was.  
  
"How did you like it?" Frisk would ask after each one.  
  
"I hated every second of it and I want to die," Flowey said back without fail.  
  
"I liked it too," they chuckled.  
  
It should have annoyed Flowey; his mind, a computer, displayed that response to this stimuli. But, the more Frisk came to understand him, the less his threats and rage worked and the less he bothered to display them. It was more like the spring breezed in on Frisk's breath and, like it or not, Flowey felt it all as if he'd bloomed in Winter.  
  
...  
  
Frisk eats their breakfast in small bites. It's late morning. Most of the other monsters in the family are out, although Flowey swears Sans was asleep on the couch a second ago and now is asleep on the table at second glance. Not that Flowey's paying much attention-- a human and monster child walk along along the road outside their house hand-in-hand. Flowey puts on his scariest face, but neither of them turn to see. He slumps.  
  
Sometimes he can't wrap his head around the fact that Chara and Frisk had come from somewhere in this giant, smelly, messy world. The two of them, from the same place. When monsters came to the surface, none of them littered, none of them stole, none of them disobeyed the curfew. Humans were the ones throwing candy wrappers over their shoulders and dumping sewage in rivers and tagging buildings at night.  
  
Of course, give it a long time and now Flowey saw monsters doing stuff like that, too. Predictable. He saw every reason to destroy this filthy world the way Chara should have.  
  
And Frisk holds his flower pot as they sit on the porch after their breakfast, and Flowey stares at the clouds up above and watches ladybugs crawling on the hedge and for a few moments, that's all the world has to be.    
  
...  
  
"Howdy, Frisk! Sure is a good morning!"  
  
It takes him a couple wake-up calls to get Frisk to get up this morning. When they do, he releases a breath he didn't know he was holding. "Time to get up, sleepyhead! The whole day's been going on fine without you! Man, it's as if the whole family's getting used to you being dead already!"  
  
Frisk ignored him and looked around the room as if they'd never seen it before. Their eyes soon rested on him. Flowey winked. "What, you don't recognize your best friend? Golly, that sure hurts my feelings!"  
  
(Flowey had done some awful things to Frisk. Frisk, though, had spent a lifetime making Flowey's lies real.)  
  
...  
  
It happened about two years before Frisk developed the Illness (something Flowey knew everyone pronounced capitalized, even if the idea of stressing words for emphasis and just speaking with emotion in general was as foreign as accent marks to English-speakers). They could still walk well enough, then.  
  
Frisk hadn't seen the teen shambling up behind them. Flowey had. They always watched out for-- watched behind Frisk, just in case something interesting happened by.  
  
The teen held the knife as if about to dice onions. Amateur, Flowey thought.  
  
He spat his line when he got close enough. "Gimme your wallet and nobody gets hurt." Christ, even his voice was shaking.  
  
"Nobody gets hurt? Oh, I don't know about that," Flowey hummed. Slowly but surely, Frisk was turning around. They'd almost made it all the way before Flowey reached out and chomped the boy's hand, getting a good feel for his teeth in human skin again.  
  
The teenager shrieked. The knife clattered on the pavement. He tried to pull his hand free but Flowey only bit tighter, breaking the skin, tasting blood. Finally! Some _real_ fun!  
  
To think, all Frisk had done was put a single hand on Flowey's head. His body tensed up and he dropped everything like a cat picked up by the scruff of his neck. The human teen yanked his hand free and fled as fast as he could down the street.  
  
(Flowey always laughs when telling this part of the story, as if talking about the biggest failure on one of those Americas Funniest Home Videos episodes. "And then, get this," he would say. "Frisk _picked up the knife_ and walked all the way down the street until they found the teen who tried to mug them. To give the knife back. Can you _believe_ it?")  
  
Frisk found him sitting on a doorstop. The teen held back another yelp upon seeing them. But the elder simply put Flowey on the ground near them- out of biting range- and sat next to the younger human.  
  
("And they- are you hearing this?- they _asked him what's wrong_.")  
  
The teen looked as if Frisk had two heads. Frisk had just repeated the question, and asked if he was okay, this is a dangerous part of town and all. They gestured at the shack with boarded-up windows behind them and asked if this was the boy's house.  
  
"P-piss off," the boy said. "Leave me alone."  
  
Of course Frisk didn't. Besides-- they still had the boy's knife. Sizing him up, Flowey doubted the boy had any better weapon. Like how funny would it be if he pulled out a gun then and blew Frisk's head off?  
  
... Not that funny, fine. Flowey told himself it wasn't funny just because he wanted to kill Frisk. He'd been trying for years. His attempts lately had been incredibly half-hearted, granted, and more resembled helping the old person around the house, but...  
  
("Of course, the boy starts crying in their arms, yeah? Broken home, no money, the usual sob story.")  
  
"Can we get out of here already?" Flowey had said. The teen boy shivered at the sound of his voice. Frisk just patted their back again like a concerned grandparent.  
  
To Flowey's amazement, Frisk did pull back. Frisk did stand up. But instead of 'getting out of here', they simply took all the money in their pocket and put it in the boy's hand, then curled his fingers around it. "I don't know where you are in life right now. I don't even know your name. But I know you can get through this with determination."  
  
When Flowey told this story, Flowey tried his hardest to laugh and laugh at how gullible Frisk is. They could have done so much with that money rather than throw it at some dweeb who'd spend it on drugs or something!  
  
Asgore would have a tear in his eye, but not from laughing; Papyrus would ask to hear it again, but not as if he'd missed part of a joke. Once again, Flowey found himself the only one laughing. He slowed it down to a chuckle, then to just the closest he had to a guilty look. Nobody understands me, he thought.  
  
Except for when he heard a slight giggling from the back of the room. Sure enough, there had been Frisk with the sun at their back. "It was kind of silly, wasn't it?" they'd said. "I'm lucky I had Flowey there to protect me."  
  
Light laughter filled the room then. Flowey's face was burning. Idiot.  
  
...  
  
Then, the Illness.  
  
The story wasn't funny to tell anymore when Frisk themself listened as if they never heard it before.  
  
...  
  
Behind his eyes, he sees his funeral. Oh, not his-- Asriel's. Flowey is sure that if he died, someone would just chuck him in the garbage bin.  
  
The crickets let out an inquisitive chirp every few minutes. Even the moon fell asleep behind a blanket of clouds. The repetitive sound of Frisk's breathing carries Flowey's mind somewhere far away from this plant body, the flower pot, even the house on the surface.  
  
'Like CIA noise torture' is how Flowey would describe Frisk's snoring, later. It had been difficult to listen to, but not because it annoyed him. The sure sound lulled Flowey into a dreamlike state. It brought Chara back. It showed him things.  
  
It's there, behind his eyes. New Home. Monsters have filled it up, on the fireplace, the lamps, wherever there's space. Froggits are lined up and down either side the entrance to the house. The odd Whimsun braves showing its face for the funeral instead of hiding in the rafters. Monsters from all over the Underground had showed up as if on a pilgrimage. They all bow their heads when the Royal Guard, led by the King and Queen, walk in with the coffin.  
  
(A few of the newer ones tried marching, all the 'your highness' jazz. Asgore had blushed. "That's really not necessary." Flowey thought his fath-- the King was so embarrassing.)  
  
Reload. Time reels back. Waterfall roars its misery louder than the quiet suffering of Snowdin forest. Maybe it's Flowey's imagination, but water rushes harder than it did normally, surging as if hundreds of monsters were... crying? Crying, Flowey almost remembers doing it once or twice.  
  
He feels nothing. He feels not even coldness as the water sprays on his face and droplets fall from his petals. It's just the old numbness.  
  
They're not mourning me, Flowey thinks. They're mourning Chara. They're mourning their freedom. It's because Asriel- because I- failed.  
  
"Monsters are weird," Asriel might have said, once. Composed of magic, emotions shaped their bodies like clay. Flowey watches a fish-monster shedding scales, launching them like bullets. There's another, melting into ooze in the ground and then re-forming in another attempt at curling into a ball.  
  
Love had just as much capacity to harm as LOVE, if not more, didn't it? None of those monsters would be in such despair now if he and Chara hadn't existed. At least, he shouldn't have existed.  
  
He shouldn't have existed.  
  
Flowey turns to face away from them, but he's been loaded back to the funeral. In the time he was gone, Asgore started to give a eulogy. At the end, he declares war on humanity as if still mourning his children. "All humans now who fall Underground," he apologizes, "are to be killed and have their Souls delivered to me at once."  
  
Flowey learns that a chasm between two people doesn't split open at once, as if from an Earthquake, but grows by the day. Toriel storms out of the house. Asgore doesn't sleep until ridiculously early in the morning, as if he doesn't remember how to fall asleep in an empty bed and an empty house.  
  
Sometimes, in the present, Flowey will hear him pacing still.  
  
It's because of love, Flowey says. They made themselves love each other. They made themselves have me.  
  
I didn't ask to be made! I didn't ask to be here! I didn't--  
  
And before he knows it, it's morning and he's thrashing on his nightstand and Frisk is waking him up for once. Patting his head. Resting a hand against his stem.  
  
Flowey can't tell if they're comforting him as a stranger or if they remember him. Either way, he clenches his teeth as hard as he can, gnashing them, filing them down, trying his hardest to feel anything except as if his soul had been left frozen in the snow.  
  
...  
  
Before bed, once, Frisk says his name.  
  
Not 'Flowey'-- his real one. Flowey regrets his pot being so shallow that he can't burrow and hide in the soil.  
  
"It's going to be alright." Frisk doesn't look well. They're pale. Their eyes are sunken deeper than usual. But they make an effort to sit up straight.  
  
Flowey doesn't know if they're talking to themself or him. They certainly didn't address him properly, if that's what they wanted. Flowey's voice barely passes for a whisper: "What, you think you're making such a difference now? Ooh, the big ambassador here, the big counselor, tossing money at strangers on the street. You think you're so caring and conscientious and... determined and... nicer than some people deserve..."  
  
He trails off until he can't make any more sounds.  
  
...  
  
"Time to get up, Frisk!" Flowey calls, just like any other Saturday morning. "It sure is another great day outside!"  
  
It's quiet. The birds outside have gone back to sleep. The house is quiet for such a big convoluted family. "Frisk. Get up."  
  
Flowey waits two minutes, then five, then ten. He hears Papyrus and Sans chattering in the room over, followed by foot stomping. Must have been a bad pun. Some things never change.  
  
He shoots a single pellet at Frisk's forehead. It bounces off. "Come on, you geriatric. If... I have to be stuck on your idiot nightstand a moment longer, I'm going to scream."  
  
Flowey thinks about it, too. A nice shriek would wake Frisk up for sure. For some reason, though, his voice won't rise above a hush.  
  
"... Frisk?"  
  
Silence. Then it hits him-- he's so numb to the sound of Frisk breathing. But he notices, now, that it's gone.  
  
"Frisk? FRISK!" he's shouting. He warbles dangerously in his pot, almost falling onto the floor. He reaches a vine as far as the edge of the bed and shakes the mattress so hard it threatens to come off the rest of the bed. He smacks Frisk lightly across the face, once, twice. Nothing.  
  
Something in Flowey's mind snaps.  
  
"H-hey-- HEY! Somebody come help in here!" he shouts as loud as his voice can carry. "COME ON! Hurry, you sloths! Frisk... Frisk needs help! Get in here!"  
  
There's a thump. The painting on the wall shakes from side to side. Flowey recognizes this. It's Toriel below hitting the ceiling with a broom. She's done it before to get Flowey to quiet down during his pranks.  
  
Somehow, the flower manages to find himself choking. "PLEASE! THIS ISN'T A JOKE! PLEASE-- MOM! DAD!"  
  
Asgore is the first to respond. He always was. Then Papyrus, then Sans, Undyne in an apron and Alphys and even Mettaton by her side and halfway through routine repairs. As if it were any other day.  
  
It's just as much a blur to Flowey as Chara's death. Asgore kneels by the beside with a finger on the human's neck. Flowey hears him praying under his breath-- to what, he has no idea. There's no pulse anyway. He's seen enough dead people.  
  
Toriel shows up last, but not for lack of trying. There are already tears in her eyes. At least everyone's focused on Frisk enough that nobody noticed Flowey calling for mom and dad, he thinks in the back of his mind. It's not much consolation.  
  
"This is all just a bad dream..." Asgore is saying to himself, over and over and over. Flowey can't take it. Flowey resets. He squeezes his eyes shut and opens them with a great big smile.  
  
He's still here.  
  
Undyne is holding Alphys into her side so hard that it looks as if she's going to absorb her. Mettaton's covered his mouth with both hands. Sans squeezes his brother's hand so tight, it threatens to break.  
  
(A memory flashes in Flowey's mind: Sans looking down at him. Pitying him. "kid. you think i dont know what a fake smile looks like? of all people?")  
  
It's not working. Flowey closes his eyes tighter this time. For good measure, he thinks the infallible: _*No! I don't want to die!_  
  
He feels the Earth reversing its rotation. He hears songs undo themselves from the universe and return to the birds who sung them. Reset. Reset, he urges.  
  
"Good morning, Frisk!" he says as he opens his eyes this time. There's a tinge of anxiety in his voice, but of course he wears his best smile.  
  
He's not alone in the bedroom this time. The whole family's there. Weeping. Why? Flowey thinks, on the edge of hysteria. There's nothing to cry about! This is just an ordinary morning! It could be any ordinary morning from any of the past weeks if he could just Reset!  
  
"Will you shut up!?" Undyne shouts. When she moves, Flowey can still see Frisk's body under the same blanket as always. "What did you even do to them?!"  
  
Flowey recoils. "What? What did I do? Why do you think I did anything?!"  
  
"Oh, I dunno," Undyne says. "Maybe your constant wild ramblings about death or every single threat I should've beaten you into that dirt for?! I have no idea how someone like the human keeps some _thing_ like you around!"  
  
"'Kept'," Alphys whispers into Undyne's shirt. "Kept him around. They're... they're gone, aren't they? They're gone."  
  
"Everyone, stop fighting at once," Asgore says. He stands to his full height, almost scraping the ceiling. "There's no blame to be placed. Their soul hasn't been stolen."  
  
That doesn't stop the suspicious glares. Of course it doesn't. In a million lifetimes and a million resets, Flowey has died every possible way and killed every possible way. But he's only felt this kind of pain once.  
  
...  
  
When they take Frisk's body away, they leave Flowey on the nightstand.  
  
"H-hey, forget someone?" Flowey says. "Hey! I don't want to be left out of this! Don't leave me behind!"  
  
But nobody came.  
  
...  
  
Of course they had to die with that damned smile on their face. Maybe that really is the worst part. Frisk looked... peaceful. Content in leaving everyone behind. Flowey was used to it. Humans had such a talent for abandoning him.  
  
...  
  
He doesn't know how much time passed. Time used to be based around Frisk. Frisk's morning. Frisk's lunch. It feels wrong for the sun to set without Frisk letting it.  
  
If Flowey thought the funeral from his nightmare was big, it looked as if everyone in the world had gathered to mourn Frisk. Monsters and humans alike stretch as far as the eye could see, out of the spacious yard, into the streets. Not as if anyone is driving. When people got close, they abandoned their cars to see what had happened to Frisk.  
  
Flowey watches from the window. He squints against the sunlight. For the first time in forever, Asgore and Toriel are side-by-side, speaking together. Giving a few words about Frisk's life.  
  
He can pick out certain people from the crowd. That metal reflecting the sun could only be Mettaton. Those whining figures with their tails between their legs could only be Greater Dog and Lesser Dog.  
  
Monster shapes were easier to pick out than human shapes. Humans all looked alike from a distance. And yet there Flowey saw him, within the first few rows of the makeshift funeral. He had the same scrawny face and shifty stance. The kid that tried to mug Frisk, all that time ago.  
  
He looked as if he'd cleaned up a little. He wore a clean outfit, as far as Flowey could tell. Oh! That must be his mom's whole brothel who drove him here! he thinks.  
  
He doesn't even bother faking a laugh.  
  
Frisk, with endless patience. Frisk, who bridged a fissure ripped by a war lost to history. Frisk, who just had to up and leave him behind.  
  
"Why didn't you Reset?" he asks himself. "Why did you let yourself die?"  
  
It was their own fault they died, isn't it?  
  
No, Flowey decides. This is a- how did Frisk put it?- lesson. A lesson in Love, not LOVE. It's all flooding back, now. It's all lived beneath the surface for hundreds of years like monsters. Despair, fear, loneliness, all of it rushes up Flowey's roots and up his back and through his body. His body that believed the world was kill or be killed until he saw a death that counted as neither.  
  
"Frisk--" his voice sounds lighter. Airier. Like laundry out drying on a spring day. Like a dusty locket and a real knife and a put-on brave face. "Frisk. Please... don't go. Don't leave me again. How could you?"  
  
And the rest: joy, warmth, sentimentality. He feels them too. If pain were water, this was the sunset on the horizon of the sea. It's not all bad. It wasn't all a calculated game like it would have been with Chara. When Flowey closes his eyes now, instead of a funeral, he sees himself on the rocking chair with Frisk or watching a sports game with Frisk or just-- existing, as if he had a place in the world. With Frisk.  
  
...  
  
He loses a petal on the third day. Everyone's been too afraid to approach Frisk's bedroom. Cleaning it out would admit moving on, admit that they really aren't coming back.  
  
As such, nobody's come to water Flowey for just as many days. It's fine. He doesn't call out for help. He's just wilting. What marvels him is that he can feel it. Fear. Nervousness. Despair-- yes, what he felt when Frisk failed to recognize him was definitely despair, all that time ago. It hurts, but it's something new in and of itself, and Flowey relishes in every moment.  
  
...  
  
After a week, Toriel gives him water and puts plant food in his soil. The sight of her stirs up emotions that his mind can't comprehend. Some sense of loss that reaches beyond a child's mind.  
  
In the end, the emotion he settles on is guilt. It's what made staying in his 'true form' so difficult after the Real Final Battle all that time ago, before he became a flower again. There existed no greater punishment for Flowey's actions than to make him regret them.    
  
Flowey spends a long time staring at Asgore's weed killer for his garden. Five minutes, or maybe a year. Just a shot of that would do it. No more resetting. No more grief. No more lonesomeness.  
  
In the back of his mind, something reaches him: "It's going to be alright."  
  
Flowey doesn't know what life is now without Frisk. But for now, Flowey chooses to believe them.

**Author's Note:**

> as if this hasn't been done before lmao


End file.
